Viola Beach: It feels like they are still on tour, stepmother says
- Published
The stepmother of a member of Viola Beach, who were killed in a car crash, has said a year on from their deaths, it feels like they are "just on tour".
All four members of the band and their manager died in a car crash in Sweden on 13 February 2016.
Guitarist River Reeves' stepmother Sharon Dunne said she and the other families were still in "shock".
She was speaking as five buses bearing a picture of the band were launched in their home town of Warrington.
She said the four piece had been "so full of life" and their deaths "so unexpected that it is like they're just still on tour".
"It's just a really weird feeling - you can't explain it, because you just don't want it to be true, and [there is] always disbelief."
Reeves and his bandmates Jack Dakin, Kris Leonard and Tomas Lowe, were in a car driven by band manager Craig Tarry, which crashed into a raised section of a bridge and plummeted into a canal.
Tests showed no alcohol or drugs in the blood of Mr Tarry.
In December, a coroner has said he did not think it would "ever be known" what caused the crash.
Ben Dunne, the guitarist's father, said he had found strength from the support the families had received.
"When you meet parents who have lost children, there is an immediate connection, but having said that from the wider community, the music community, there's been so much empathy and love towards us," he said.
The Arriva buses, one of which has been converted into a mobile recording studio, have been produced in collaboration with the River Reeves Foundation, an organisation set up by Mr Dunne in memory of his son.
Mr Dunne said the foundation, set up to support young people in the performing arts, was founded to see "good to come to other people".
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